Boris Johnson gives evidence to the Treasury committee in the House of Commons.
Photograph: PA

Boris Johnson has been accused by a senior Conservative of adopting a “busking and humoresque approach” to the European Union after a series of his claims about the EU were challenged by MPs on a Commons select committee.

The London mayor said that many of his views on the EU had been traduced after MPs from the three main parties sitting on the Treasury select committee questioned his recent interventions on the EU.

In a series of spiky exchanges, the Tory chairman of the committee, Andrew Tyrie, told Johnson he should adopt a more balanced approach to the EU.

Tyrie turned on Johnson after the mayor quoted from a 1991 pamphlet in which the former Treasury special adviser reportedly wrote that a single market could not complete without a single currency.

The chairman of the committee said Johnson had misrepresented him “quite badly” because he had written that the single currency project was being formed at a dangerous moment.

Tyrie said to Johnson: “It is very kind of you Boris to read all my material. But you are illustrating ... a very partial, busking – really – humoresque approach to a very serious question for the UK. What we really need is a much more balanced approach in which people make an effort to qualify and represent the points that they make and represent each other’s views with some accuracy. You are at it again.”

Johnson replied: “I am glad you said that because I think some of my views have been traduced.”

The exchanges came after Tyrie had challenged a series of anti-EU claims by Johnson. Members of the committee pointed to a Daily Telegraph article by Johnson last month in which he highlighted a number of “ludicrous” EU rules.He wrote on 22 February: “Sometimes these EU rules sound simply ludicrous, like the rule that you can’t recycle a teabag, or that children under eight cannot blow up balloons, or the limits on the power of vacuum cleaners.”

Tyrie pointed out that the toy safety directive requirements had issued a warning that children under the age of eight could suffocate. It asked that the warning be placed on the packaging and did not prohibit children under the age of eight from blowing up balloons. Johnson said: “Even the EU would be very hard put to invigilate people’s households in such a way as to actually prohibit people under eight from blowing up balloons.”

Johnson admitted that his claim that the EU bans the recycling of teabags, which originates from the EU’s animal byproducts regulation of 2002, was a “classic example of gold plating”. This describes the way in which UK officials over-interpret EU rules. He said Cardiff council issued the warning on the basis of the regulations that stated that items that have come into contact with milk and meat cannot be recycled.

John Mann, the Labour MP for Bassetlaw, pointed out that UK government had pushed for the animal byproducts directive, prompting Johnson to say that had been done in light of the foot and mouth outbreak.

Helen Goodman, Labour MP for Bishop Auckland, highlighted Johnson’s remarks on 11 March, when he said: “What I think we should do is strike a new free trade deal along the lines of what Canada has just achieved. They have taken out the vast majority of the tariffs and have virtually unencumbered trade. We want a relationship based on trade and cooperation. The idea of being subject to the single judicial system is the problem.”

Goodman pointed out that the Canadian deal did not include financial services. But the London mayor changed tack when he said: “I don’t want to imitate the Canadian deal. I want a British deal.”

Johnson also claimed that the UK’s EU membership hampered the fight against terrorism. He said: “We are thinking today particularly about how to combat terrorism and the threat that poses to to our societies. I have seen various people quoted as saying that remaining in the EU is essential for our security. I think it is important to put a counterveiling point, which is that there are some ways now in which the ECJ [European court of justice] is militating against our ability to control our borders in a way in that we would want to do and indeed to maintain proper surveillance.”

The mayor cited the example of the niece of Abu Hamza after she allegedly tried to smuggle a sim card to him in prison. Johnson said she could not be deported because the ECJ could adjudicate on the EU charter of fundamental human rights. He added that the ECJ also says the government cannot retain mobile phone data that could be used for monitoring terrorists.

Johnson said: “What has that got to do with completing the internal market? What has that got to do with free trade? The answer is absolutely nothing. The answer is it is morphing into a political union of a kind that I think is no longer, on balance, in our interests.”